Tuesday, August 06, 2013

Behind our house is a small man made pond that the builder put in when he started to develop the land. We assumed that there are no fish in it because no one stocked it. Each night we enjoy listening to the bullfrogs croaking and they croak all night long. I never realized that they're nocturnal. This summer we've had a great blue heron visit the pond. Yesterday I was being lazy, I didn't want to get out of bed so I was reading. I happen to look out the window to the pond and saw this bird.

I wasn't sure what kind of bird it was but suddenly mom flew out of the cattails. The little bird followed her but flew very clumsily and just made it across the pond. It sort of looked like a heron but shorter and stockier.

A few minutes later they flew back to the original side they were on. The fledgling is in the foreground and mom is in the background. She was teaching it how to get food. After some research I discovered that they are green herons. They live in this part of New York state only in the summer.

Later in the day our resident great blue heron showed up

wondering what she was going to have for dinner.

On the menu was bullfrog. She held it in her beak for a good five minutes dipping it back into the water a few times. After dinner she went for a leisurely stroll along the edge of the pond.

Also at the pond yesterday was a female banded kingfisher. She dove head first into the pond and came up with a fish that I didn't know was there. She went up into a tree to eat her snack but she dropped it down into the weeds.